This application is based on French patent application No. 97/04091, filed on Apr. 3, 1997, which is incorporated by reference herein.
The object of the present invention is an integrated circuit card provided with bonus counters storing bonus points granted to the holder of the card during transactions which he makes using this card. The invention can be used particularly in the field of multiple or universal applications. This can notably be the case with a bank payment card with which it is possible to make various purchases from various suppliers.
The applications of this type, making it possible to manage bonus counters, related for example to loyalty programs, are currently located either in central sites of the operators, or in terminals capable of interfacing with the integrated circuit cards. In certain cases, the integrated circuit cards themselves have bonus counters. However, in this case, these counters are dedicated to a single use. For example, through European patent application EP-A-0 311 495, a bonus counter is known which makes it possible to allocate, to the holder of the card, bonuses proportional to the period during which prepaid units have not been used. In a sense, it is a case of a service providing interest on the units not yet used. This type of bonus recorded in the card is of course adapted only to remuneration, and loyalty creation, with regard to the service which can be acquired with this card, here a banking service.
When the loyalty creation counters are situated in central sites, or in terminals or readers capable of interfacing with the card, the following problems are encountered.
Where the applications are located in central sites, the bonus units, points, are determined only in deferred time, and not immediately at the point of sale. This is because each reading terminal is connected to the central site only during the evening. At the time of connection, it indicates, for a given customer account, the number of points allocated to it.
In the case of applications located in the terminals, a first problem arises of complexity of implementation of the loyalty creation options in all the terminals in a group. In this case in addition, so that the cohabitation of the loyalty creation application with the payment application is made secure, it is necessary to put, in the readers, a protection circuit known as a SAM (secure application module). In particular, security is necessary to guarantee the totalling of the points in the card. The SAM circuits must themselves be changed regularly, which makes these readers expensive and difficult to manage.
The object of the invention is to remedy these drawbacks by recommending a calculation of the points by the integrated circuit card itself. In this case, in the invention, provision is made for causing an indication to be sent by the terminal which enables the integrated circuit card to identify the service provider or vendor. From this identification, the integrated circuit card can seek in its executable program rules specific to the service provider or vendor identified. It can then calculate, in order to store them in a specific counter, points relating to this specific supplier. The result of the calculation can be stored in the reader or, preferably, in the card.
The object of the invention is therefore an integrated circuit card having, in the integrated circuit of the card, a microprocessor for executing a program of an application with a first set of rules, and a bonus counter for accounting for bonuses resulting from the application of these rules, characterised in that the integrated circuit of the card has a memory for storing the program of the application, in that the program of the application has at least a second set of rules and a test, the test serving to detect, in a message sent by a reader to the integrated circuit card, an item of information relating to one of the sets of rules, the test then serving to initiate the rules of the set detected, the integrated circuit also having as many different bonus counters as there are different sets of rules.
Another object of the invention is a method of counting bonus points in an integrated circuit card having, in the integrated circuit of the card, a microprocessor for executing a program of an application, characterised in that
several sets of bonus calculation rules are stored in the card,
a reader in connection with the card sends a message to the card giving information on its identity,
with the message sent by the reader the match between this identity received and a set of rules is detected,
the rules of the detected set are initiated, and a count of bonuses corresponding to these rules is calculated.